


More Miraculous AU’s

by AboutTheMountains



Series: The Miraculous Universes [2]
Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Badass Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug, Count Down AU, Lost AU, Marinette is the true ladybug holder, So Serious AU, Some of these are identity reveals, Young Influences AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-17
Updated: 2021-02-08
Packaged: 2021-03-15 04:27:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,029
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28807308
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AboutTheMountains/pseuds/AboutTheMountains
Summary: Here we go again with more Miraculous Ladybug AU’s! Aka the random stories that pop into my head at ungodly hours of the night/morning.First Chapter: Count Down AU (The people of Paris have clocks on their wrists that count down to the second they die. Too bad they seem to die every other day in akuma attacks. Some people, however, are a little different.)Second Chapter: Young Influences AU (The Dupain-Cheng’s come across the ladybug miraculous when Marinette is a baby and gets her ears pierced. Mari grows up with Tikki’s influence.)
Relationships: Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir & Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug
Series: The Miraculous Universes [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2069919
Comments: 6
Kudos: 62





	1. Count Down AU

The clocks didn’t appear until the first akuma attack. 

At first, people saw their clocks and freaked out. Nobody knew what they meant. Everyone had different numbers that were all counting down. 

The clocks all had times ranging from years to days. Nobody knew what they meant until the first time somebody’s hit zero. 

The day some people’s hit zero, the first akuma attack became deadly. 

The akuma was a middle aged man who had just been fired for being late to his job because of the weather. He was akumatized on his way back to his house. His powers were to cause people to be trapped in their own little deadly storms. Paris was filled with little tornadoes, hurricanes, earthquakes, lightning, fires, hail, and thick smog. Over a hundred people’s clocks reached zero that day, and the people of Paris finally learned what the clocks meant. 

They counted down to the time you died. 

Of course, the miraculous cure brought everybody back, and their clocks were restarted, but now everybody dreaded their clocks reaching zero. 

Everyone in Paris had at least a few days on their clocks, if not weeks. Nobody but three people had over that. 

Then Chat Blanc happened. 

Ladybug and Hawkmoth’s timers hit zero. Chat Blanc’s didn’t. 

Then past Ladybug came to the future with her clock still running and saved the day. 

That timeline was erased. Clocks were reset. Nobody knows why every single clock in Paris hit zero all at once before resetting. Nobody except Ladybug. 

Marinette Dupain-Cheng had a different sized number than everyone else. As previously stated, three people in Paris have longer numbers than everybody. 

Hawkmoth is one of them. Excluding Syren and Chat Blanc, his timer read about seven months (he would eventually make an akuma that kills him with a volcano in the middle of Paris, spreading lava everywhere, including the Agreste manor). 

Adrien Agreste was another. His timer was five months (he would eventually sacrifice himself for Ladybug, again, and then she’d slap him/hug him when he was brought back). 

Marinette Dupain-Cheng’s clock had decades. Being Ladybug, it was important that she didn’t die. She had immense pressure on her to not get killed during the deadly akuma attacks. (Her clock hit zero during Chat Blanc, but after that it went up so high she had to hide it from people)

Now here’s a few facts about the clocks:

-They appear only in Paris. If you leave, they become invisible. Technically, they’ve always existed, and they exist on everybody, but only if a miraculous is active is the magic seen. Therefore, Hawkmoth activates his miraculous, now the people within his city can see their clocks.  
-They only count down to absolute death, not just magical interference. For example, if Timebreaker magically uses people to go back in time, the clocks don’t think they’re dead. However, if they are smashed by a huge truck during an akuma attack, they’re dead, and their clock will count down to that moment.   
-They are golden, glow, and are on everybody’s inner wrist.   
-They are incredibly hard to hide since they glow, and only if you put a very thick material over them can you not see the numbers. 

Facts about this universe:

-Marinette Dupain-Cheng’s numbers are higher than literally anybody’s in all of Paris, so it makes her very suspicious (“Honey, if I didn’t know you I’d think you’re Hawkmoth” -Sabine, probably).   
-Lila Rossi lives to make Marinette Dupain-Cheng’s life miserable.   
-Marinette Dupain-Cheng hides her clock because of this. 

Mari hides her numbers, which seem suspicious, but she explains that she doesn’t want to know when she dies. People take it in stride. Some people even follow her and wrap their own numbers (you’d think that most people would wrap their wrists, but some people didn’t because they wanted to be aware of the deadly akuma attacks). 

(Lila Rossi does not like Mari’s reasonable excuse. 

Lila accuses Mari of somehow having a high number because she knows a safe place to hide from the akumas. Since it’s a good cover story, Mari almost uses the excuse. 

Except it’s not true, so she’d be lying, and also her classmates would think she doesn’t want anybody else to survive, so she’s keeping the hiding place to herself. She does not have a hiding place, so she can’t help them hide. 

She refutes the accusation, and tells the class that she just doesn’t want to know when she dies, but its too late and the seeds of doubt have been sown.)


	2. Young Influences AU

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Dupain-Cheng’s come across the ladybug miraculous when Marinette is a baby and gets her ears pierced. Mari grows up with Tikki’s influence.

IrisIce on AO3 commented   
“You know how some parents go and ear pierce there babies ear at a young age? I was wondering if you can do an AU where marionette's parents pierce her ears when she is one year old with the ladybug miraculous (which have been lost for decades, I don't know, they found them in a vintage store or something) and marionette grew up with the added influence of Tikki and miraculous magic. Or alternatively baby Adrian gets his ears pierced instead and a toddler marionette somehow swallows plages ring with no one the wiser that she did and they both grew up under the influence of the miraculous.”

Ooooo ok ok I see you. I like both of those, but for now I’m going to try to do the first one justice. My sister got her ears pierced when she was little because she wanted to be like our mom, so I think this would be similar. 

When Marinette was 5, her parents got her ears pierced. Baby Mari saw that her mama had earrings, and she wanted to match. So her parents took her to a nearby thrift store, and they found these cheap earrings that were sitting in a pretty box, and they bought them for baby Mari. They close the box, take them to the register, and buy them. 

They get back home, and go to open the box, when a glowing red orb appears. 

Boom, Tikki appears, Tom freaks out and calls her a bug-mouse, while Sabine is like “what the heck are you” but doesn’t freak out because she’s a cool, calm, collected person. Tikki introduces herself as a kwami and explains how she was lost a long time ago. 

Now I’m gonna make more stuff up because why not. 

You know how the peacock miraculous is damaged? Yeah. We’re gonna say that there was a big fight between the miraculous holders. Butterfly and Peacock versus the other main miraculous’. Fu was young(er), so he couldn’t win against all these other holders. The Cat and Ladybug were fighting with the Peacock when the Ladybug’s lucky charm hit the peacock miraculous. Now injured, the Peacock tried to get away. The Butterfly saw his partner and tried to help her by quickly defeating his opponents. He somehow managed to deal with the Bee and Fox, and started to go after the Cat and Ladybug. Let’s say that he fatally wounded the Ladybug, and injured the Cat enough to get away with his partner. 

Fu grabbed all the miraculous he could and ran away after the peacock wielder made a sentimonster that started destroying the temple. That fight was how the ladybug, butterfly, and peacock miraculous were lost. The peacock and butterfly obviously went with a young Gabriel Agreste and his wife (at the time girlfriend), but the Ladybug was taken by some random soldier after the Ladybug died. 

(I have more ideas for the fight if anybody wants me to write them down, but that’s where I’m leaving that right now)

Anyways. 

The soldier had the ladybug miraculous, and managed to lose it when he made a drunk bet or something. The person that got it next had it for two days before losing it in a very big crowd. Someone picked it up and gave it to a jewelry shop so they could make some money. It made it’s way through a few pawn shops before stopping at a random thrift store near the Dupain-Cheng’s bakery. 

Aaaaand welcome back to the main story again. 

Ok so now that Sabine and Tom have the story, they ask all about how the miraculous works and if they’d be expected to use it. Tikki is like “I don’t know what you could do, since we have no way of tracking the peacock and butterfly miraculous. I also don’t know where the current guardian is, so we’ll just have to wait. In the meantime you should totally keep your eyes out for potential Ladybugs.” And so that’s what they do. 

Marinette wears Sabine’s earrings while Sabine wears the ladybug miraculous, because while she got the earrings for her child, Marinette is a baby and probably shouldn’t be trusted with very powerful magic earrings. However, Tikki watches over Marinette while her parents work in the bakery, so Mari still grows up with Tikki’s influence. 

This leads to some fun times because Mari is a human child, while Tikki is like super old and has no grasp on what human children should know at what age. So Mari grows up knowing far more than she should. By age 10, she’s at a middle school science level, high school math and english level, and college history level. She knows a lot of stories from Tikki’s past ladybug holders, which gives her many stories that other people don’t know about. 

While I think that Marinette’s main personality would stay the same, I do think she calms down a little because she has a more grounded grasp on everything. Tikki may have a bubbly and overall happy personality, but she also has seen a lot of death and destruction, so she’s more of a realist than an optimist. 

This means that when Marinette meets Adrien, she analyzes the situation and hears Adrien out when he explains that he didn’t put the gum on her seat. It also means that while she may crush on him, it’s never over-the-top and she is able to act normal around him. 

Anyways we aren’t there yet. Backing up a little. 

So in the show we saw that Wayzz was able to tell when the butterfly miraculous was being used in a malicious way, right (it’s been a while since I’ve watched Origins so I’m guessing)? So Tikki is just chilling in Mari’s room while Sabine and Tom are in the bakery setting up and Mari is just waking up to get ready (Tikki had Mari make a normal schedule for herself to make sure she never slept in too late) and suddenly she feels the butterfly miraculous activate, only it wasn’t positively. It was very very negatively. This sends Tikki into a panic because she doesn’t know what to do. She also is hopeful because this may mean the guardian can sense it too and find her. 

Problem one arises when she realizes she doesn’t have a permanent holder. Sabine may have her, but she’s not a true ladybug holder. The couple had looked out for potential ladybug holders, but neither knew what to look for. They were also limited to their customers at the bakery since they didn’t leave much. 

Problem two arises when Marinette leaves for school, and then comes back because one of her classmates just turned into a giant stone monster what the-

But problem three is the real problem, because Sabine has the earrings and she doesn’t want to be a superhero. Problem three is that Sabine and Tom close the bakery and go upstairs to talk, and Marinette can hear them.

Now, Marinette knows more than she should about the earrings and the miraculous, but that doesn’t mean she’s aware that her mother is currently the only person who can stop the evil stone person and cure him. 

Luckily Tikki tells her. 

So Sabine and Tom are arguing about using the miraculous or not (at one point Tom says that he will put them on himself if he has to) and then the news shows this _kid in a leather cat suit hurling himself over rooftops with a metal pole_. And Marinette comes downstairs and goes “I’ll do it.” 

So here’s the part of the story where I tell you that Sabine and Tom absolutely Flip Out because _there’s no way that you’re going out there to fight this magic stone being Marinette, you’re a child._ And Marinette just points to the tv where the news is reporting about the cat hero, and she’s like _if he can do it, I can too._

Which, I mean, isn’t the best way to phrase that when the cat hero suddenly face plants onto a billboard, but she’s trying. 

Marinette’s counter to her own reasoning is something like “ok, I know I’m young, but that means I’m also fast. I’m quicker than either of you, and I’m definitely quicker than a stone monster. I also have been taught about the ladybug miraculous for years, so I know how it works. Plus, someone needs to teach cat boy how the miraculous work, so the ladybug needs to be active anyways. I cant just _not do something.”_

And like,,, that’s as compelling as she’s gonna get, so she just stares as her parents talk to each other with their eyes, and then Sabine sighs, which Mari knows that means she won. 

So yayyy Sabine gives Mari the earrings, and Tikki excitedly flys around her head and then suddenly _Ladybug_ is standing in front of the two proud (and also very scared) parents. 

So this time, Mari is prepared and purifies the akuma, meaning no Stoneheart part two. That also means no Hawkmoth speech, and Chat doesn’t fall head over heels with Ladybug. 

So looks like I have to do something about that. 

The next akuma is an invisible one. Let’s say that Sabrina got akumatized a little earlier than canon. So Vanisher is out and about, but something happens to make her akumatized object break, leading to a free butterfly. And this has never happened before because usually the akumas are pretty apparent, so Ladybug and Chat Noir appear quickly to take them down. But since Vanisher is invisible, they never knew. 

So the butterfly is free, and it duplicates itself (Hawkie is like “oh that’s cool I should do that more often”) and suddenly butterflies are everywhere. 

The difference between Stoneheart and Vanisher is that one is a giant stone monster while the other one literally cant be seen. You’d think no one would notice. 

But if you’re talking to someone and they suddenly vanish, people are going to talk. 

So boom, Ladybug and Chat Noir are on the scene. LB’s Lucky Charm was a giant bag of flour that covered all of Paris in white, so the heroes were able to take down Vanisher no problem. (Is this probable? No. Is this insane? Maybe.)

All the akumas swarm the Eiffel Tower and make-up a Hawkmoth head, and LB purifies them and makes her speech, yada yada. 

Sabine and Tom are watching this from their living room feeling very proud of their daughter because she had become the strong independent woman they always knew she was. 

Bonus:

You can bet that one day Marinette is sick somehow so Sabine takes the earrings and becomes Ladybug 2.0 until she’s better. 

Bonus bonus:

Sabine: You’re grounded, young lady! No computer for a week!   
Mari: But I need the computer to do homework!  
Sabine: Fine. Then no phone for a week.  
Mari: But I’m doing a group project right now and I need it to talk to my teammates!  
Sabine: Well,, Uhh  
[Looks around, sees Tikki]  
Sabine: Fine! No Tikki!  
Mari: _NO TIKKI?!?!_

Bonus bonus bonus:

Master Fu: Wayzz, what the heck is that?  
Wayzz: That would be the lost ladybug miraculous in use, Master.   
Master Fu: Excuse me, _what._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This has been sitting in my docs for literally a month now.... Anyways.


	3. Lost AU

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gabriel Agreste loses the butterfly miraculous. Plagg finds it and Nooroo and takes them to Adrien. Cue Mental Breakdown #1. 
> 
> (The alternative AU to the “Run Away AU” in the first part of the series, chapter 11)

Similarly to the Run Away AU, Gabriel has to take off the broach eventually (to sleep, shower, whatever). Only instead, he somehow looses it. Whoops. Cue the frantic and unkept Gabriel Agreste. 

I mean honestly, if you’re going to lose any miraculous, of course its going to be the tiny purple one that looks like a button. 

Now as we’ve established in canon, the kwami can magically phase through anything. While the miraculous may not be able to, the kwami can. So the butterfly miraculous is lost, and Nooroo goes with it. It’s wedged between the floor and the foot of Gabriel’s bed, but you wouldn’t be able to see it unless you moved the entire bed, or you were a kwami. 

Here’s a fun fact: Plagg is a cat. We all know this. We also know that cats are very curious and mischievous. So of course one day Plagg is snooping around in Gabriel’s bedroom, and he phases under the bed and freezes. 

He freezes because not only is there a miraculous under his chosen’s father’s bed, but there’s also it’s kwami and wow doesn’t this have bad connotations. 

So yay small kwami reunion. Plagg manages to get the entire story out of a shaking Nooroo before Adrien even knows Plagg is missing (he had been doing homework, thinking Plagg was just invading the pantry). 

So Plagg is like “hey lets get out of here I’m hungry,” because his priorities are to camembert and camembert alone. He picks up the butterfly miraculous, and with Nooroo following, they both leave and go to Adrien (after a quick cheese stop). Plagg flies in the room, unnoticed by Adrien. He nonchalantly goes “hey kid I got something for ya” and drops the butterfly miraculous on top of Adrien’s homework. Adrien pauses and asks “what is this” and Plagg pushes Nooroo towards his chosen and says “oh it’s Hawkmoth’s miraculous” and Adrien’s like

what. 

This is what?!

And so now we have a confused and panicking Adrien, a panicking Nooroo, and a cheese-happy Plagg. 

Eventually Adrien calms down enough to question Plagg, who tells him about the miraculous being in his father’s room, setting off the second round of panicking because _that can only mean one thing._

(Ok truthfully his first thought was that his father was sleeping with Hawkmoth but his second thought is that his father _is_ Hawkmoth so at least he got it right in the end?)

So Adrien transforms into Chat Noir and takes Nooroo and the miraculous away from his house, and calls Ladybug frantically. Ladybug, however, takes a while to pick up since she wasn’t transformed. So by the time Ladybug picks up, Chat is pacing on the Eiffel Tower being like “what the heck what am I gonna do my father is evil Ladybug’s gonna take my miraculous-“ and when he sees his partner’s face he just spits out “you were right. Hawkmoth is Gabriel Agreste” and Ladybug doesn’t even react and says “I’m on my way.”

In record time, his lady is landing in front of him, and immediately is attacked with apologies and a stressed out cat boy. She’s like “are you ok?” And of course he’s gonna respond with “no of course not my dad is hawkmoth” because he isn’t thinking clearly since his brain is just chanting ‘Father is Hawkmoth Father is Hawkmoth Father is Hawkmoth.’ 

And Ladybug didn’t know who Chat was, but this still would have been terrible and stressful news because that means that Chat is currently living with _and related to_ Hawkmoth who has been magically terrorizing Paris for two years now. Only then she remembers the first part of this conversation which was ‘Hawkmoth is Gabriel Agreste’ and her brain is like _what_. Chat is related to Gabriel Agreste. Chat is Gabriel Agreste’s son. 

Chat Noir is Adrien Agreste. 

Uhhhhhhhhhhh

So yeah. Then we have a moment when Ladybug is just staring at Chat Noir to try and see any similarities in him and her schoolgirl crush, but her staring is starting to freak Chat out, so she snaps out of it because _priorities Marinette._

And now it’s mandatory hug time! Yayyyyyy!

In this house we give Adrien Agreste hugs bc he deserves them. 

Anyways. LB hugs Chat Noir to death and then resurrects him to hug him some more. Meanwhile Chat is freaking out internally for obvious reasons. 

Eventually though they pull away from each other and Chat reveals something he’s been clutching in his hand this entire time: the butterfly broach. 

Ladybug’s first thought is “oh my god he has the miraculous with him” but then she’s like “oh my god that means no more Hawkmoth.” 

Which isn’t 100% true. We know this because of 2 problems that arise. 

Problem 1: They forgot about the peacock miraculous. 

Problem 2: _They forgot about the peacock miraculous but Gabriel Agreste didn’t._

So Gabey thinks he lost the butterfly miraculous because technically he did, so there’s no reason to be suspicious of his son or the miraculous heroes (of course, he never dismisses the second accusation). He takes the peacock miraculous and transforms into Le Paon to cause more trouble. He sets an amok loose, because his powers are used on inanimate objects, so he can use them on anything at any time. The only problem with this? Our heroes know who he is now. 

Ladybug decides to take him to her house because there’s no way he’s going back under the same roof as Hawkmoth. Which, of course, leads to Chat asking “why are we on Marinette’s balcony?” And Ladybug being like “I may or may not be Marinette.” 

Listen, she knows her partners identity. It feels wrong to keep hers a secret. Plus, Marinette hates lying sooo

Chat Noir just freezes for a second and then he thinks “add it to the list of things to freak out about tomorrow” and follows the now detransformed Marinette into her room. He releases his own transformation and watches Mari’s face for any reaction, but she’s already had her daily panic of the day so she’s met her quota. Instead, Mari smiles sadly, bundles him up in blankets, and gives him all the hugs he deserves. 

Not even an hour later the peace is shattered by screams because Le Paon decided to make his presence known. 

Sigh.

Instead of going towards the screams, our two heroes head towards the Agreste mansion. They go to the back of the building to try and sneak in, and that’s when they see a large butterfly window. 

“Honestly, I shouldn’t even be surprised at this point.” 

So the two break the window, beat up one caught-in-the-middle-of-an-evil-monologue Gabriel Agreste, and take the peacock pin. Yayyyy. Ladybug also merges the peacock with the ladybug miraculous so that she can recall the amok feather, and then she uses the miraculous cure to fix the damage it caused. 

The next problem comes when they’re wondering what to do with the now helpless man. 

Ladybug asks Chat for his opinion, but he says that his opinion is biased, so he can’t choose. LB suggests some different punishments, and the two talk them all over. Meanwhile, Gabe is just laying on the floor in defeat when he remembers something important. 

“My wife!” 

LB and Chat: what

Once they made sure he wouldn’t try anything, the two heroes follow Gabriel to his strange and creepy basement where an unconscious Emilie Agreste is laying in some sort of chamber. 

Cue breakdown #4 from Chat. 

Luckily, Ladybug is there, and she’s the guardian, so she quickly figures out that Mama Agreste is in a magical coma as a result from using a damaged miraculous. And she’s like “you know, if you told us why you were doing this, I could have healed her a long time ago.” And Gabe is like “you can do that?!” 

LB: well only once I became the guardian  
LB: but yeah I can heal her  
LB: but that doesn’t mean you’re off the hook  
Gabe: that’s fair

Nothing’s just unicorns and rainbows, though. LB and Chat announce to Paris that Hawkmoth and Mayura are officially defeated. Gabriel Agreste suddenly announces he’s partnering with several non profits and donating to several charities, as well as starting an Akuma Therapy Program for those who need a support group. Lila Rossi was fired from Gabriel (the brand) and was given a restraining order from Adrien. Ladybug held meetings with Gabriel Agreste to make sure he was keeping his end of the promise, and also to heal Mama Agreste. 

Two months after HLHMD (Hawkmoth Lost His Miraculous Day), Mama Agreste wakes up. She’s not instantly healed, she still can’t do much except hold small conversations, but it’s a start. 

Adrien and Mari start to heal. They can finally react to bad situations like normal humans. Lila is put in her place (finally). Mari and Adrien talk about being Ladybug and Chat Noir. There are breakdowns and shutdowns. Suddenly all the negative emotions are put on display. 

Paris doesn’t go back to the peaceful, romantic city it once was in a day. 

But Marinette is an optimist, so she likes to think it will some day. 

Bonus:

Here’s Chat’s internal monologue when he saw the butterfly window:

Chat: I expected nothing, and yet I was still disappointed  
Chat: Wow I must be really unobservant, huh?Chat: Why is this window so dramatic?  
Chat: I mean, he couldn’t be any more theatrical?  
Chat: Why couldn’t it have been a normal window?Chat: When was this even installed?  
Chat: How did I never notice this being installed??Chat: Oh my god the Gabriel symbols on everything  
Chat: They’re all butterflies

Bonus Bonus:

Here’s Ladybugs’s internal monologue when she saw the butterfly window:

LB: Oh, gross.  
LB: How is this man a famous fashion designer?LB: He dresses like a candy cane.  
LB: Why did I ever look up to him?LB: Wait......  
LB: Oh my god he’s the one who poisoned my eyes with all those akuma designs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok eww first off, I apologize for the ending. After writing it I immediately regretted it. But I’m too tired to change it. I was gonna end it on a cliffhanger, but I figured the mushy semi-sweet ending would be better than the cliffhanger ending, soooo


	4. So Serious AU

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chloe’s relentless bullying led to Marinette growing a backbone. She now takes nothing from nobody, and because of that, she changes some things.

Marinette grew up being an optimist. She also grew up with Chloe’s bullying. Another thing she grew up with was Mme Bustier’s “let them handle it themselves” tactic. 

In canon, Mari’s selfless kindness never falters. But what if it did?

Marinette Dupain-Cheng can be kind. She can be selfless. She can be an optimist. 

But she can also turn into a Take-Nothing-From-Nobody when stepped on for years and years. 

And so the story happens like this:

We have Mari wake up on time, go through her normal routine, go to cross the street, when suddenly an old man decides that today is his death day, and walks across the street without looking both ways. Mari runs out to save him, and is confident in her actions, so therefore she still has all her macaroons. She still offers one to him. 

She gets to class on time and meets the new girl. She doesn’t care what Chloe thinks anymore, so she just rolls her eyes and sits next to the new girl after Chloe goes through her whole dramatic spiel. The new girl tries to boost her confidence, but realizes that Mari just doesn’t care what anybody thinks of her (but don’t mistake Mari’s confidence for rudeness, she still befriends the new girl after explaining to her about Chloe’s bullying). 

A stone monster attacks. She wordlessly goes home. She finds a strange box in her room. 

She becomes a superhero. 

Because of her confidence and serious attitude, this Ladybug is 80% professional and 20% having fun with this. 

(Tikki never explained about purifying the akuma, though, so Stoneheart round 2 still happens. Mari is firm in the belief it’s not her fault, though, so she goes through none of that “Alya deserves this more than me” and “I shouldn’t be a superhero” nonsense)

Chat still 100% falls for this girl. 

Back at the school, Adrien enters the building and becomes a part of the student body. 

The gum scene still happens, but instead of ignoring Adrien’s reasoning, Marinette crosses her arms and demands him to explain himself. He does, and she accepts his explanation, but she makes her stance on bullying clear. Adrien is like “but Chloe is my only friend,” and is immediately adopted on the spot. 

Akumas like Stormy Weather and Mr. Pigeon still happen, but the one’s affected by Marinette either change, or don’t happen. Timebreaker, for example, doesn’t happen because Confident Marinette has 2 hands and can hold a banner and a small watch at the same time (I’m not salty). Lady WiFi also doesn’t happen because Marinette shuts Alya down right away with very good reasoning why Chloe cant be Ladybug. 

A fun thing that changes is that Mari teaches Adrien to rebel against Gabriel. She doesn’t teach him how to be rude or anything, but she teaches him how to negotiate and stand up for himself. Adrien learns that Gabriel’s whole “I’m too busy to see you, make an appointment” thing is wrong, and he speaks up about it. 

Of course, Gabriel takes most things with a grain of salt, but for the most part things lighten up. For example, Adrien has less photo shoots during school, and he has more free time (as long as he keeps his grades up). 

Eventually Lila comes to the school. Marinette doesn’t dismiss her right away, but she makes her suspicion clear. She also doesn’t call out Lila in front of Adrien as Ladybug, but she talks to both Lila and Adrien individually. Without the embarrassment, Lila doesn’t become akumatized. Adrien is told she’s lying, and he texts Nino about it later that day. 

There is no “high road” needed because Adrien knows the difference between a tabloid and a bully thanks to Mari. 

The high road never comes up though because Mari makes sure Lila knows she’ll take none of her lies. Lila’s lies are debunked the second they come out of her mouth with real proof. Lila knows Jagged Stone? Marinette conveniently has his number. Lila knows Prince Ali? Rose has his number, Rose why don’t you text him? Lila has tinnitus? The nurse’s records say otherwise, but just in case why doesn’t she call your mother, Lila? She should have her number since she’s the class president.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Anyways. Mari also takes over the world in this AU by becoming the most popular fashion designer ever and also being a superhero on the side but we’re not there quite yet. Let me know if there’s anything specific you want me to add to this AU :)

**Author's Note:**

> Come say hi to me on tumblr at elizabeths-rambles! Even if it’s just to pop in my asks and tell me about your day :)


End file.
